German Op-ed: Israel cannot be a Jewish state

‍‍January 9, 2014 - ח שבט תשעד By Ebony Brown

A German newspaper, Neue Osnabrück Zeitung, published an op-ed last week, “Israel as Jewish state: Unacceptable demand,” sparking outrage in the German Jewish community. Author Franziska Kückmann compared the recognition of Israel as a Jewish state by the Palestinians with the creation of either a theocracy like the Islamic Republic of Iran or an “apartheid state,” where non-Jews would become second-class citizens.

“Both versions are incompatible with [Israel’s] claim to be a modern state and may not be accepted by the world community. As long as Israel provides such unreasonable conditions, [its] assertion to be interested in a two-state solution is is not worth anything,” Kückmann wrote.

Michael Grünberg, head of the Jewish community in the city of Osnabrück, said the article is a “new form of anti-Semitism” and that the author “denies Jews the right to their own state.”
— JNS.org